butterflies

Winging It ~ Chance Encounters With Aerial Kind

In the old tales birds are often messengers, bearers of foreknowledge – for good or ill. They overhear things that humans don’t, come unbidden to help the hero in their quest, although their warnings are not always understood or welcomed.

In Kenya (and other parts of Africa) the Red-Chested Cuckoo is the bearer of good news. Its three note call says the rains are coming – ‘time to dig’, ‘time to dig’. On the other hand, in some interpretive versions, much depends on the geo-location of the call. If you are setting out on a journey and the call comes on the right of the path, then it signifies that all will be well. But if it comes from the left, then there’s danger ahead; better go home and wait for a more propitious day.

I think the two birds in the first photo are rooks. All members of the corvid family (rooks, crows, ravens, choughs, magpies, jays) tend to have a poor reputation on the bad omen front, but since I have a twosome here, I’m choosing to see them as beneficent. I’m also reminded of the magpie sighting rhyme: one for sorrow, two for joy.

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Butterflies also have spirit world connotations. In cultures across the globe they represent transformation and rebirth, joy and happiness. A butterfly may also be seen as the embodiment of a human soul, although a crowd of them might be thought an evil portent. I’m happy, then, to come upon this single tiny Common Blue butterfly, sipping at grasses on a summer’s evening.

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And as for the bees, most of us know that, as pollinators alone, they are absolutely indispensable. The value of their produce too is inestimable. They are admired for their busyness and sound work ethic; the therapeutic hum in spring orchards.

It’s not surprising, then, that in many ancient cultures they were revered. They conferred blessings even on the gods. For instance, Apollo’s gift of prophecy was bestowed on him by three bee maidens, or in older pre-Hellenic versions of the tale by a trio of bee goddesses. Other texts see the bee’s origin as dramatically supernatural. One Ancient Egyptian version has it that they arose from Sun God Ra’s tears as they fell on desert sand. What an image. I think I believe it.

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Lens-Artists: Wings This week Beth at Wandering Dawgs gives us a fabulous theme to work with.

September Harvest

Warm winds this afternoon, and a flurry of Red Admiral butterflies about the garden. Also out on the lawn, the alcoholic waft of gently fermenting apples – windfalls from our gnarly trees. The trees are in need of serious remedial work – if reclaiming them is even possible. Most of the fruit is spoiled before it falls – lots of pests and diseases, and some very spotty articles. But that said, there’s been enough good fruit to make a few pots of cinnamon and honey poached apple. And more to come.

As for this Red Admiral, it was spending a lot of time supping from a very rotten apple. I wonder if butterflies get squiffy. It might account for all the whirling about that was going on as I hacked away on project-liberation-greenhouse. It’s almost free from the overbearing hedge, but a lot of broken panes where hawthorn and ivy branches have leaned too heavily. For now, though, it’s good enough to shelter two bucket-planted tomato plants brought from Broseley. They’re still fruiting, if sporadically.

Our other tomatoes are an outdoor container variety, Tumbling Tom. They ripened very nicely on the terrace wall during our week of hot September weather. Here they are doing just what it says on the packet: cascading from their pots in profusion – out of summer and into fall.

Lens-Artists: What’s Bugging You?

I don’t need to be asked twice to reprise photos from my bugs and butterflies archive. And this week at Lens-Artists, Donna is doing the asking.

Comma butterfly on Doronicum ‘Little Leo’ aka Leopard’s Bane.

Peacock and the bee.

Marmalade hoverfly visiting the crocosmia, a variety which I’m pretty sure also had marmalade in its name.

And another kind of hoverfly on a lace flower.

Elephant hawk-moth found one day on the garden wall.

This ladybird has found the perfect ‘platform’ on a Dyer’s chamomile daisy.

White-tailed bumble bee ‘bathing’ in Hollyhock pollen.

We could call this a bee line: oriental poppy here we come. BZzzzzz!

Lens-Artists: What’s bugging you? That’s this week’s question from Donna at Wind Kisses. Go see her fine gallery of close-up bugs, bees and butterflies.

Chasing Butterflies

And to start with, a Red Admiral for Jude. This month at Life in Colour she is looking for all things RED. She also tells me they are rather short on butterflies down in Cornwall. Not so in Shropshire.

Yesterday at the allotment all the plots were brimming with butterflies, mostly cabbage whites looking for any unprotected brassica leaves for a spot of egg laying. They’ve even been coming into the polytunnel, attracted by some overgrown Tuscan Kale seedlings that I failed to plant out in the spring. I’ve also found a comma and a gatekeeper in there.

But the biggest draw is the Buddleja on one of the abandoned plots. No wonder it’s called the butterfly bush. Even so, the butterflies are very wary, so you need to sneak up on them if you want a photo:

And a gatekeeper on a morning glory leaf in my polytunnel:

Today A Piece Of Sky Fell In The Garden

And here it is:

…a male Holly Blue butterfly Celastrina argiolus on the sedum. Blue butterflies tend to be very skittish, and as far as I know I’d not seen a Holly Blue before, though they are quite common. This one was also very shy, and after he flitted off to feed on the oregano flowers would only show me his underwings. But still, they are also very pretty – at first sight white, but then a shimmer of iced blue.

Some Peacock Perspectives

Today in the Sheinton Street garden we have both sunshine and warmth, elements that have been lacking so far this month. And so amongst the Doronicum we also have a profusion of peacock butterflies, sip-sipping like mad at the tiny compound flowerlets. I watch them as I hang out the washing – the survival imperative played out before our very eyes.

Square Perspective #30

On The Path To The Allotment: A Retrospective

I usually do have a camera in my pocket when I go to the allotment, although gardening and snapping are not ideal co-activities given the photographer’s general grubbiness. Anyway, here are some of my favourite shots from the past few years: nature small but beautiful, and in no particular seasonal order. I especially love the header photo though – the winter sun caught in a windfall apple that has been hollowed out by blackbirds, so many natural forces at play here.

Also the fact that I caught a Common Blue butterfly, wings open and with a one-handed click and it turned out to be pretty much in focus, is hugely pleasing. These little butterflies flit about at high speed, and seem especially nervous if you point a camera at them.

Most perversely too, while my gardener self fumes at finding dandelions, thistles and bindweed in the garden, since they are the most difficult weeds to oust, I still admire their beauty, and in all their phases. And the bees clearly love thistle flowers too.

So much to see all around us. We only have to look.

Lens-Artists: Nature

This week Patti at Lens-Artists gives us nature as her theme. Please call in to see her and the other Lens-Artists’ work.

Gatekeeper, Skipper And Blue And A Mystery Moth For Pete

I found the allotment teeming with bees and butterflies the other evening. As you can see, the butterflies really love the oregano flowers. The little blue butterfly was too skittish for me to get a good photo, but I’m assuming it is a small blue or a common blue.

One of the best thing about Word Press is how one blogger introduces you to another although they are poles apart across the planet. In this case Ark down in Johannesburg who documents his garden’s wildlife visitors (please go and see his latest slide show of some of Africa’s loveliest birds) gave me a nudge to visit Pete Hillman who documents wildlife from his home in Staffordshire, the next door county to mine. He takes very beautiful photos and is a fund of knowledge over what’s what.

So now for my mystery moth. These are rubbish photos due to the high speed whizzy movements of the subject. I’m thinking it is a hawk moth of some sort. It was out late the other morning, pile driving the phlox flowers with a very scary proboscis. Most unnerving. Over to you, Pete…

Garden Bistro Dish Of The Day

Today’s take-away special is definitely the oregano nectar smoothie. The Cabbage White butterflies and the honey bees have been gorging themselves, and while I am not too thrilled about feeding up the Cabbage Whites – given the mayhem they can create among my cabbages and broccoli – I have to admit they did look very lovely flitting around in the guerrilla garden. In fact I think I shall rename our unofficial planting behind the back fence ‘the biodiversity plot’ because, even as I write this, there is an awful lot of it going on there.

Noteworthy action includes crowds of longhorn beetles busy replicating in the spearmint flowers and on some ragwort that has recently arrived uninvited; skipper butterflies on the lesser knapweed, ringlet butterflies on the phlox and oregano; also passing tortoiseshells, peacocks and commas, and some rather small hoverflies.

Most of the bumble bees, however, are inside the garden still scoffing on the drumstick alliums. Now for a gallery of some of today’s lunch-time clientele: